A detailed look at the huge shifts in global competition since the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He finds that the world system is lurching towards further conflict, and that the US has re-asserted its dominance, to the cost of Europe.
"We are witnessing an historic global re-alignment of force. The principal winner, so far, is the United States. After Russia, whose invasion of Ukraine was clearly misjudged and has issued in several setbacks, the western European powers are the big losers. Germany, the heart of the EU and the wider project to construct a third pole between the hegemonic US and a rising China, has ceded much to the re-assertion of US dominance.
History might record the war in Ukraine, the economic war and this wider re-alignment as a grand prequel to the US pivot towards China. Conflict with Russia, a declining power, has acted as an accelerant towards this looming conflict. Flashpoints between rivals are multiplying around the world, and Europe is being drawn increasingly towards the showdown in the south China sea and elsewhere. Britain will play a key role in this pivot. In the process, it will seek to re-integrate with its European allies, overcoming some of the post-Brexit ruptures from the transnationalist status quo.
The outlook is, therefore, a grim one. A global remilitarisation, led by the world’s hegemonic power, drawing its allies, patrons and clients into the vortex of geostrategic competition. Resistance to this war-drive is essential."